Many states have responded to budget crises by creating state lotterys; citizens voluntarily participate in various state-sponsored lottery games and the state government retains some of the proceeds to enhance the state treasury.
Many lottery games require the lottery player to feed a play slip into a scanner means; the scanner reads the player-selected numbers, prints a lottery ticket bearing the numbers selected by the player for the player to keep as a receipt, and returns the play slip to the player.
It takes time to fill out the play slips, so many people submit the same play slips every time they play the lottery game. The play slips, since they must be fed into a scanning machine, must remain in a substantially pristine condition, even after multiple uses. The scanner will reject a play slip that has tattered corners, for example, and such rejection necessitates another time-consuming completion of a play slip.
Perhaps more importantly, the lottery ticket/receipt generated by the scanner's printer must be retained by the player until the winning numbers of the lottery are announced. The prize cannot be claimed in the absence of the ticket.
Some players keep their play slips and tickets in purses, but such storage eventually results in tattered play slips and lost tickets. Billfolds will hold the tickets, but will not hold the play slips without folding them.
Over the years, inventors have developed a number of holders for lottery paraphernalia and flat articles in general.
For example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,721,309 and 4,781,379 to Miesel and French Pat. Nos. 2,575,077 and 2,483,243 disclose plastic envelopes having pockets for lottery wagering paraphernalia. The envelopes have pockets that include closure flaps and indicia on the outside of the pockets.
Clear plastic envelopes having pockets with flaps for keeping the contents of the pockets from falling out are also shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,358,983 to Lyndes et. al., and 3,884,412 to Price. Similar items are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,234,086 to Dorton, 4,713,136 to Felipe, and 4,726,970 to Morrish.
Flaps that may be quickly inserted into holding straps are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,688,699 to Garner, Jr., 1,589,118 to Cowen, 2,346,571 to Ginsberg and 1,370,636 to Dwyer, and German Pat. No. 384,257.
Devices which show slots or slits instead of holding straps appear in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,944,132 to Caprile and 2,087,825 to Vaughn.